LDN World Database – Low Dose Naltrexone

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This is a database of persons who have tried low dose naltrexone, their diagnosis, dosage and response to it, if any. The database lists many different medical conditions.

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For example, persons with Multiple Sclerosis, will choose the link above, that has hundreds of persons with MS who have tried naltrexone. Don’t forget to see more pages once you reach the bottom. For a graph of the overall responses, then go back to the main link on Multiple Sclerosis where you see these choices:

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If your condition is not listed, check Other on the left side of the list.

This forum is from LDN Research Trust, a registered non-profit Charity based in the UK, with participants from many countries internationally.

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I will soon be posting several case reports of my patient responders, persons with intractable pain from various conditions. Some have been pain free one or two years on naltrexone. Some who had years of previously intractable pain have responded to low dose naltrexone and remained pain free more than one year after discontinuing LDN.

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MECHANISM

for those who like to know the science

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We have known for decades that naltrexone binds to the mu opioid receptor. It blocks the effect of opioids like morphine at the mu receptor. We now know it also acts at another receptor.

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You may wish to watch this video that explains Toll Like Receptors, TLRs for short. This is a lecture by Dr. Rachel Allen, whose PhD in immunology is from Oxford University. After that, she worked at Cambridge University on innate immune receptors such as the TLR’s.

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In 2008, it was shown that naltrexone binds at one of the Toll Like Receptors, the TLR4 receptor. There are 13 Toll Like Receptors, and so far they have studied naltrexone only at one of them, the TLR4. That is important because the TLR receptors are part of the innate immune system.

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The Toll Like Receptors are not like other receptors. Not these snug little pockets where naltrexone binds. Instead the Toll Like Receptors are like an entire football field, with enormous nooks and crannies where it has many interactions with many molecules. Now, in 2010, scientists are asking if naloxone or naltrexone is acting at TLR4 or even higher up in the cascade.

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The study of immune cell glial interactions is in its infancy. Glial cells are the immune cells in your central nervous system (brain, spinal cord). They are very involved in dysregulation of pain systems, neuroinflammation, and some neurological diseases such as Multiple Sclerosis, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s Disease, ALS, infections of the brain, etc.

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One of our distinguished glial scientists, Linda Watkins, PhD, in October 2010, said we are not even sure naltrexone binds to the Toll Like Receptor. Rather, it involves AKT1, close to the TLR4 receptor, very very high up in the cascade at the dimerization step, the recruitment of CD14. This is being worked out now.

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Dr. Watkins with Kennar Rice, PhD, from NIH/NIDA, et al, has a paper in press in Cell:

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Glial activation participates in the mediation of pain including neuropathic pain, due to release of neuroexcitatory, proinflammatory products. Glial activation is now known to occur in response to opioids as well. Opioid-induced glial activation opposes opioid analgesia and enhances opioid tolerance, dependence, reward and respiratory depression. Such effects can occur, not via classical opioid receptors, but rather via non-stereoselective activation of toll-like receptor 4 (TLR4), a recently recognized key glial receptor participating in neuropathic pain as well. This discovery identifies a means for separating the beneficial actions of opioids (opioid receptor mediated) from the unwanted side-effects (TLR4/glial mediated) by pharmacologically targeting TLR4. Such a drug should be a stand-alone therapeutic for treating neuropathic pain as well. Excitingly, with newly-established clinical trials of two glial modulators for treating neuropathic pain and improving the utility of opioids, translation from rats-to-humans now begins with the promise of improved clinical pain control.

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You can read many new publications on glia that I posted on my site here, or find it from the banner at top:

Donate to Eliminate Neuropathic Pain

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I am a member of a Neuroinflammation Research Consortium that will be studying these many conditions, some that are painful, others that are not. They involve glia and neuroinflammation.

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For more discussion of mechanisms of action of naltrexone and other publications I have posted, see here, particularly the paper by Zhang, Hong, Kim et al.

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Finally, for those who may feel they are losing heart because medicine has been too slow to adopt the use of low dose naltrexone, let me point this out:

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Dr. Linda Watkins is a University of Colorado Distinguished Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience at the University of Colorado Boulder. She is a world-renown leader in glia research and the neurological applications of glial attenuation, with a focus on alleviation of chronic pain. She is the recipient of the highest award for distinguished basic science research from the American Pain Society and the 2010 John Liebeskind Pain Management Research Award from the American Academy of Pain Management. She has over 300 peer-reviewed publications including articles in Nature, Science, Nature Neuroscience, and Journal of Neuroscience. She received over $2 million in NIH grants supporting 6 generations of IL-10 gene therapy research culminating in XT-101.

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The material on this site is for informational purposes only.

It is not a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis or treatment provided by a qualified health care provider.

2 Responses to “LDN World Database – Low Dose Naltrexone”

Can LDN therapy help w opiod induced hyperalgesia? i have a lot of pain. Altho i guess uncommon, i developed OIH in very short period of time w rapid escalation of increasing pain and need for stronger and stronger pain meds. over this time frame of 6 weeks now on methadone but it is not sufficiently controlling severe elbow tendonitis pain. am not able to function much. haven’t been working, etc.–any input? thanx, paula

Naltrexone is valuable for different conditions in different dosage ranges.

If you are on opioid analgesics, then the ultra low dose of 1 microgram to 40 micrograms may be helpful to many, depending upon the dose of opioid you are taking. But a dose of 1 to 4.5 mg would cause you to go into opioid withdrawal. There is data that shows people who taper off opioids have less pain.